LANDOVER, Md. — The Maryland players began the day at FedEx Field with only 10 men lined up on offense, a spot left open on the line for Jordan McNair.

They ended the day gleefully racing from one side of the stands to the other as center Ellis McKennie waved a red banner with McNair's number, 79, emblazoned on it. The home fans roared and the band blared "Maryland Victory Song."

Everything else on Saturday afternoon was an emotional rollercoaster. The grief players felt after losing their teammate McNair didn't stop just because they beat 23rd-ranked Texas 34-29. And they still find themselves in the grip of a scandal that purports a “toxic culture” in the program, which has resulted in coach DJ Durkin being placed on administrative leave.

Nobody in or around the program trotted out the stale cliche of the season opener being an "escape" for mourning players. As interim coach Matt Canada said earlier in the week, "We're never gonna be done with that. It's not like it's ever gonna go away, and we're not asking it to go away."

So the team, the coaches and fans in attendance threw themselves into the moment, embracing the chance to pay their respects to McNair on the biggest stage made available for them so far. They supported the players, many of whom were the ones who brought the problems inside the program to light, to investigators and reporters. They tried to make something positive out of the most negative situation the school has faced since at least the death of Len Bias in the 1980s, if not ever.

That included the missing-player alignment on the opening snap, a delay of game penalty, which Texas and coach Tom Herman graciously declined. The players also waved the flag during and after a moment of silence was held before kickoff, and their helmets bore a sticker with No. 79.

“That’s something the guys wanted to do. They wanted to go out there and make sure Jordan was remembered,’’ Canada said of the 10-man lineup. "Everything we've done to honor Jordan is from our players. They're the ones who decided it, talked about it. It was special, it was emotional — it’s emotional right now that we’ve started talking about it. I'm proud of our players.’’

With all the meaning the players poured into the game, though, the announced attendance at the home of Washington’s NFL franchise was 47,641. Large swaths of the lower bowl were empty, while the sections behind the Texas bench were packed with Longhorns fans. The upper deck of the 82,000-seat stadium was closed off.

Plenty of Maryland fans and alums expressed in the week leading up to this game that they could not celebrate the big game and treat it as if it were normal, and they weren't sure how excited they could get about football in general amid this turmoil.

As the game approached, however, campus leaders encouraged students to keep supporting the players and not hold the allegations engulfing the entire administration — including university president Wallace Loh and athletic director Damon Evans, who both attended the game — against their fellow, traumatized students.

Thus, it was the student sections at FedEx Field celebrating hardest throughout the game, and where the players ran to cheer after the final seconds ticked off following the game-clinching interception with 51 seconds left. They also came back in huge numbers after the 1-hour, 26-minute thunderstorm delay early in the fourth quarter to cheer the players down the stretch and to honor McNair one more time.

The players rewarded that support by managing their emotions from start to finish as they took a 24-22 first-half lead, then fell behind 29-24, then rallied back in front and turned Texas over on its last three possessions.

“We're really a close-knit family; everything that has happened this summer, it's brought us closer together," said quarterback Kasim Hill, who has now begun his and his team’s seasons with wins over Texas two years in a row.

“This is as close as I’ve ever been with teammates (and) coaches," Hill continued. "It was just great to get a win, be back out there. It's been a long time since we've played a football game, and it was just fun to be back out there with everybody."

Added wide receiver Taivon Jacobs: "The team just stuck together over this whole course of everything that’s happened, and we stayed together. That was our motto, and we stuck by it."

The team plans to keep the game ball in the locker dedicated to McNair, Canada said, to be handed to his parents on senior day. McNair's parents, remember, have been highly critical of the way their son was treated and are not close to being done with their dealings with the university. How they'll feel about the program by the home finale on Nov. 17 against Ohio State is anyone's guess.

Maryland's next home game will be on campus two weeks from now, against Temple; by then, both investigations into McNair's death likely will be complete and the fates of the principals decided.

That will be the next test of how ready the program, the players and the university are for the next stages of the tragedy they dealt with Saturday.